Friday, December 14, 2012

Relevance of Sir Creek

India
and Pakistan share an international boundary stretching over 3000 Km
length. Most of this border is well defined, except for Kashmir and a
small part of the border, where it joins the Arabian sea. This small
part of the border, which is only 96 Km long has been a long dispute
between India and Pakistan. What
is surprising is that this disputed part of the border is not even an
arbitrary line drawn by some mediator or an arbitrator but lies
along a definite geographical feature: a creek that opens into
Arabian sea. This creek divides the Kutch region of the Indian state
of Gujarat with the Sindh province of Pakistan. It is located at
approximately 23°58′N 68°48′E. Wikipedia says that it is known
locally as 'Baan Ganga'. However I failed to find any corroborations
for the name.

In
1924, the then British Government installed mid channel markers along
entire Sir Creek as boundary markers between Sindh region under
Bombay presidency and princely state of Kutch ruled by Prince Rao
Maharaj. Pakistan does not recognize these mid channel markers and
says that the border should be along the east or Indian side bank of
the creek, whereas India wants the original 1924 markers as
International boundary.

Many
people wonder as to why such a small waterway has gained so much of
importance and why no one wants to budge from their positions. To
find answers to these questions, we need to go into little bit of
history and find out exactly the reasons for fixing the boundary at
Sir Creek in the first place. Let us first begin with the eastern
part of the boundary between Kutch and Sindh. A look at the map and
the terrain makes it clear that the this entire boundary runs along
the shore line of a vast inland lake of marshy land and salty water
known as Rann. Even an 1878 map shows this boundary very clearly and
without any ambiguity.

Towards
the western part, a town called “Lakhapat” is located on the
Kutch side of this Rann. Just north of this town, a river known as
“Kori” continued to flow as late as 1875, though intermittently
going through cycles of fresh water flows and marshlands. Ali Bandar
town (In Pakistan now) was situated on the bank of this river and
from here, the river flowed southwards towards Lakhpat.

This
Kori river is of great historic significance as it was known as east
mouth of Indus. In fact, during times of Alexander the great (325 BC)
and Ptolemy (150 AD), it was called “Lonibare” and was one of the
main mouths of the Indus river. Water wars began between people of
Kutch and Sindh over sharing the Kori water as early as 1764, when
Kutch army was defeated. In 1764 and again in 1802 great dams were
built on Kori making the downwards river bed completely dry. This
converted the once fertile rice fields of Lakhpat into grazing
grounds.

In
1819 a huge earthquake struck Lakhpat. This completely destroyed the
so called eastern mouth of the Indus or the Kori river into marshy
land filled with ups and downs. As an aftermath, a Tsunami wave
struck Kori creek.

Quarterly
journal of Geological society 2, 103, (1846 ) mentions a letter by
one Mrs. Derinzy sent to one Captain Nelson. This letter describes
the Tsunami in Kori river.

"One
of Capt. McMurdo's guides was travelling on foot to him from Bhooj.
The day he reached Luckput there were shocks of an earthquake, which
shook down part of the walls of the fort and some lives were lost. At
the same time as the shock the sea rolled up the Koree (the eastern)
mouth of the Indus, overflowing the country as far westward as the
Goongra river (a distance of twenty English miles), northward as far
as a little north of Veyre (forty miles from the mouth of the Koree),
and eastward to the Sindree Lake. The guide was detained six days
(from June 19th to 25th during which time sixty-six shocks were
counted. He then got across to Kotree, of which only a few small
buildings on a bit of ground remain. Most of the habitations
throughout the district must have been swept away, the best houses in
Scinde being built of sun-dried bricks, and whole villages consisting
only of huts made of a few crooked poles and reed mats. The guide
travelled twenty miles through water on a camel, the water up to the
beasts body. Of Lak nothing was above water but a Fakeer's pole (the
flagstaff always erected by the tomb of some holy man); and of Veyre
(Location
of this place is unknown now)
and other villages only the remains of a few houses were to be seen.
There are said to be generally two earthquakes every year at
Luckput. The Sindree Lake has of late years become a salt marsh."

As a
result of earthquake, entire Sindh shoreline north of Rann also rose
up like a bund. This is known as “Allah's Bund” or God's Bund.
This God's bund effectively diverted the eastern mouth of the Indus
forever.

Ever
since then, depending upon the floods in Indus basin, the Kori basin
gets filled with sea water and fresh water or remains marshy and dry
and has almost become a part of Rann, uncertain and undefinable.

History
of Kori river, since earth quake of 1819 makes a fascinating
reading. I quote from Imperial Gazetteer ( with places of names
changed)

“ After
1819, at Lakhpat, where it used to be fordable, the river bed became
eighteen feet deep. About sixteen miles further up, from two to six
miles of the bed was raised and beyond that the level of Rann fell
forming a basin of twelve feet deep. Beyond that bed of river rose up
to Ali Bandar (What
is named as Allah's Bund).
At the same time a great wave (a
Tsunami) rushed up
the river and filled the basin with salt water. For eight years the
channel of the river was closed except during season of floods its
bed was nearly dry. In 1826, upper Indus burst its banks, overspread
the desert, and clearing every dam before it, burst through Ali
Bandar, filled the Shakoor lake with fresh water and sweeping the
silt, so cleared the Kori bed that boats of 100 tons could pass from
sea to Lakhpat town. For three years, the Kori continued to come down
in so large a stream that it was open for trading as far as Amirkot.
Meanwhile, Sindhi's were building their dams and in 1834 the Kori
stream was almost stopped. In 1838, except during rains, the channel
was dry. For next 36 years (1839-1874) silt kept gathering in the bed
of the river below Ali Bandar. In 1856, there was water enough for
boats to go up to Shakoor lake from mouth of river. In 1868, a boat
could not pass further up than Lakhpat. In 1874 there was another
flood on the Indus, a large body of water run through the Ali Bandar
and filled Shakoor lake.”

Readers
may be wondering as to why I have been talking about Kori river at
such a great length, when the subject of this article was the Sir
Creek. For that, let us now turn to a map published in 1908 by
Imperial Gazetteer. This map outlines the borders of Kutch state and
Sindh Province. This border runs from east to west more or less along
the present international boundary between India and Pakistan and
then turns down sharply south along the shores of Rann or the salt
water lake to Kori creek just north of Lakhpat town. This map
confirms the old traditional boundary between Kutch and Sindh, but
does not take into consideration the changes that took place in the
geography after 1819. The new border alignment was finalized between
Government of Kutch and Sindh, first in 1914 and again in 1924-25.
These new agreements, took into consideration the geography of the
region, which had changed completely. The entire area west of Kori
river bed had since changed into uninhabited marshlands without any
geographical features. During the monsoon season between June and
September, the creek flooded its banks and enveloped the low-lying
salty mudflats around it. Later it would again become large tracts of
Marshy lands or mudflats.

I
think, that it would be obvious to readers, that in such kind of
geographical landscape, which keeps changing all the time, how can a
border be fixed? The only recourse was to fix it along the nearest
geographical feature that was stable and this feature was a large
body of water now known as Sir Creek.

Sir
Creek is navigable in high tide, and fishing trawlers use it to go
out to sea. In such a case it would be obvious that, placing mid
channel markers to mark the boundary between Princely state of Kutch
and British controlled Sindh province was a well thought out and the
correct approach, which was implemented in 1924.

Pakistan
perhaps have their own reasons like control over the exclusive
economic zone in the Arabian sea that can extend up to 200 Nautical
miles and possibility of finding Hydrocarbons and their commercial
exploitation, for not to agree to mid channel markers. However one
thing remains clear to me, Sir Creek is the only stable and
recognizable water body in that area and it should be shared by both
countries by treating mid channel markers as international boundary.